This is Goodbye
by loveandzelink
Summary: Compilation of depressing, Zelink oneshots. 1stCHPT: Hospitalized, she wills for goodbye if only then would he step up as her hero and last goodbye. 2ndCHPT: Zelda was none to push at fate until Link fell in love with her. PostTP. 3rdCHPT summary inside.
1. I

**A/N: This is a very late giftfic for writer, _MagMags_.** (Here it is, girl! Even though I finished a long time ago, and I messaged you like a hundred times about it, but I guess I might as well put it up now.)

Zelda belongs to Nintendo; Happy Reading everyone!

~ loveandzelink

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><p><em><strong>This is Goodbye<strong>_

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><p>A door.<p>

A door defined as "Room 415" stood before me, chipped in wasted white paint and little seemly marks from nurses roughing their way in. A door like this shouldn't confine the most wonderful person in the whole entire world. There should be greater doors_—_doors washed over in a splash of coated paint and doors shining a squeaky yellow knob, but well dusted from faint traces of fingerprints.

But, _godsdamnit_, it's only a door.

Coming to an end, I reached out my hand outward, reaching, reaching until fingers_—my fingers—_curled over the cold metal of the doorknob. I flipped my wrist, a small squeak signaled that the huge frame was crying to creak free. It was thoughtlessly pushed to the side but this stupid door portrayed as if it stepped aside just for me.

Ungrateful, I slipped through.

Inside was a similar story. The little room mirrored; the walls were chipped in wallpaper and portraits of dull flowers poorly tried to hide that fact as different marks littered across the dull flooring. There was dull furniture on the floor: a small bedside dresser, hospital machines that I haven't bothered to remember, a picturesque of potted flowers_—_and so many of them_—_ending with a single bed.

A bed holding its prisoner.

She's a prisoner.

I unsteadily made my way over to her, my eyes trained on the irrelevant floor. Once over to her direct left, I perched on her bedside instead of making use of the bedside chair. _Screw_ the chair, along with the bed, they were material accomplices of keeping her prisoner in this room that's no different than a jail cell.

I seethed with unprovoked anger and she sensed that of all things.

Silently, she could tell the turmoil racing in my veins and laid a faint hand over mine. _Featherweight, papery, soft, cold, pale as the moon itself._ She could sense all the different thoughts battling in my head and she squeezed her excuse of a hand over mine. _Weak, painless, sweaty, reassuring, with the farthest of strength in the tiniest of muscles…_

"Link."

I squeezed my eyes shut.

"Link."

Easily, my healthy hand flipped over her own hapless hand, taking hers captive as her bed captured her now. My other hand joined in the small ransom but with the care of someone who simply cared.

"I'm glad you finally came."

I opened my eyes. A bright-eyed girl gazed at me with a knit cap over her bare head. Her cornflower blue eyes were the only feature of her holding light; the paleness of her cheeks had forever lost the radiance of a rose and her lips fared the same. Usually hair the color of sunny summer hung near her temple before swooping past her cheeks. Now the strings of her cap brushed the colorless of her cheeks; pompoms dawdled at the end with rhythmic grazes to her chin.

"I've missed you."

_Me too_, I told myself, a burglar of my hand traveling up to finally meet herself. She was so different, _too different_ as my hand roamed the valley of pale moonlit flesh. She_—_being her_—_only dropped her light head into my palm, smiling all the while my fingers curved over the light arc of her cheek.

Light. So light.

"Link? You don't look too good."

"I'm okay, Zelda."

She smiled even brighter, two features to carry her light.

"How was your trip?"

"Why are we talking about me?"

Her eyes crossed all the way to the right, as if pondering childishly with a tilted head. Perhaps if it was not for my hand holding her head.

"What do you want to talk about, Link?"

Gently, my hand guided its captive over to where she belonged. With the prisoner on the bed. Then it flew over to the prisoner's other cheek, curving along with it's accomplice. Her smile revealed a giggle, a flash of rose sprung before being taken over by the roaring paleness again.

"I want to talk about my apology."

Her eyes returned to normal only with the exception of beautiful, blue orbs widening. In shock?

"You have no reason to apologize."

"Yes. Yes, Zelda, I do. I'm sorry. Actually, 'I'm sorry' doesn't even come close to cover how pathetic I'm feeling. I'm just… so pathetic." I confess to her all-too shocked semblance, shamefully speaking to her twiddling fingers.

I go on.

"Those letters. URGENT URGENT URGENT, they all screamed at me but I ignored. You always had the most foolish reasons for urgent. You lost your favorite costume tiara, you lost your wolf doll, you lost your kingdom in _Legend of Hyrule_. But I didn't want to catch a plane back here to help you find some tiara, or some doll, or even some fictional kingdom. _I knew you hated goodbyes_. I thought you only wanted to see me again. I really thought you were just being _selfish_ out of all things. That's what I honestly thought, Zelda, honestly."

Zelda stayed silent.

"But then my roommate noticed the letters and read one. He looked shocked, fairly enough. I was infuriated but then he argues that I should read a letter or two. There was at least three dozen, maybe even five. I had to read the one he had." I paused, resounding pains moaning from the depths of my queasy stomach. "_Zelda_. The only word to catch my eye. _Ill_. Then the whole. _Zelda is terminally ill with brain cancer_."

"Link_—_"

"I read back to first letter. That date was seven months ago. Seven. Seven _long_ months ago. How stupid am I?"

"I don't_—_"

"It was rhetorical, Zelda." I laughed, humorless and this room amplified that excuse of a laugh. "So I booked the next ticket home. That was the next stupid move. _You cannot leave right now_, they said. Yeah, they were the 'Swordsmen Academy.' So I quit. I quit them and packed my damned things and left immediately to see you. Really, Zelda, how stupid am I?"

She didn't answer this time.

"Stupid, stupid,_ stupid_ me. Now I'm seven months and three weeks too late, aren't I, Zelda?"

"I'm still alive, Link."

"How much longer?"

Her smile saddened, back to featuring her eyes as only light. "Not much longer."

"Is it really too late?"

"Link," she whispered but my name slipped off her tongue in a muddled sob. I mentally kick myself for causing her to be in such the conflict of the truth. "There's simply nothing they can do. They found the tumors too late and it continues to grow even when my father placed me into the last resort, the surgery." Both of her hands flitted to my left hand where they clasped with that tiniest of strengths.

"There is nothing they can do, Link." At the end of her hope, she allowed a few tears to slip before I catch them from dropping off the cold valley of her cheeks. I stare at her, incompetent to her tears, then defiantly argue her, for her.

"Too young. You're way too young. Aren't the younger ones the better to live?"

"Too late."

I lowered my head in defeat along with disgust at the pining still tumbling in my stomach.

"It's not your fault, Link. Remember that there are no fingers to point at." She absently allowed a few of her fingers to brush against my knuckles, soft and light as dove feathers. I cringed that she thought innocent ways, even from what I had done to her.

Left her alone. Heartbroken. Helpless.

_Alone._

"I'm the only one who deserves everyone's accusations," I argued, but helpless.

She smiled. "You can't always be the scapegoat."

Painfully, I remember our so-called past with childish demons towering over the both of us. I remember their eyes varying in green, blue, brown, and then that hated golden, but they all held that abnormal demonic gleam. I remember those glares directed at me before they charged to the side, _to her_. I remember panicking before lunging between and then bearing my punishment as long as I saved her. But now, in the future where they are here no more, there was no way to _save her. _

"I'm definitely not always the hero."

"No, silly," she seemed to further her efforts to push off my hands so she could set them in her lap, "you don't realize how much I believed in you. Despite what happens to you in the end, you jumped to become my hope. So you're not stupid. Not at all. Even though you said 'goodbye,' I kept faith in you 'cause you're _my _hero, Link. I've always had faith in my Link." A shy smile lined her lips and I only smiled back at her.

"I've always had faith in you too, Zelda," I mirrored her words, truth ringing with her phrase, "but this stupid hero isn't too good with goodbyes." I mentally slap myself for suggesting the future and then pity myself for gods-know-how I'll continue on this wretched world without her. _Stupid, _I am. Angry, my stomach twisted and turned in revolt.

Her shyness changed to one of confidence. A glow to her cheeks was displayed and I wished my hands weren't ensnared by hers so I revel in the warmth of those cheeks.

"This is goodbye… but where is that faith of yours?"

I answered her with a skeptical look.

"Erm… Faith?"

She laughed, the sound was dulcet to my ears and I bent closer to hear them echo off again and again.

Giggling softly, she murmured, "I do hate goodbyes." She closed those very blue eyes and I watched her closely. "Though we said ours, though I watched you board that plane, though I missed you from minute one, I still kept hope in that you weren't gone. Maybe it will be different this time," She opened her eyes this time to face me, "with me being the one on a long long voyage elsewhere… but I have faith that I will reside with my hero_._"

Sheepishly, I said, "That's really cute, Zel." Her words had flown right over my head.

"No, Link!" She grabbed at me, almost making me jump. Not from the sheer strength she imposed, but the surprise that she portrayed such excitement. "I'm with you!"

A bit taken aback, I squirm under her deceivingly tight hold. But as her forehead laid warm onto mine, I was disillusioned to think we could last in that position forever, so I relaxed to with voluntary shut eyes. Only a kitten's breath away, I breathed in when she did, however the resounding breaths did little to cover our placid pulses. The peace forced the end of the twisting in my stomach. Then, slowly, did she willed her goodbye as she broke away and I seeped in a small suction of air.

I stilled. She shuffled in her sheets.

I breathed out.

We both stilled.

"Have hope in me," she called from her bed. Her voice blurred, almost far away.

Far away she might be, but her words held the tiny ring of hope. And her hope glittered somewhere, strangely enough _inside _of me. I thought it might have raised from the black queasiness of my stomach before fluttering out from the ashes. Maybe this is what she meant as me never leaving? Is this the aftermath of goodbyes?

Is this what keeps us together?

"Yes."

I opened my eyes. She smiled sadly.

"'Goodbye' isn't so bad, is it?"

_Beeeep._

"What was that?"

She kept on smiling.

_Beeeeeep._

_Damnit_, I knew what that was. I knew that most machines in this cell of a room were nameless to me but one with a sound like that couldn't be hard to remember. I knew 'goodbye' should give me some effort here.

"Zelda."

_Beeeeeep._

"If I can't save you, then a hero at least gotta raise his damsel's faith a little higher." Then did I only pull out a tiny box from my lap and into her hands, all the while biting back the urge to cry in front of her. Zelda held her breath while her fingers worked the translucent ribbon off the top of the box. Her forefinger only slipped at the end of the bow before the entire thing collapsed. Slowly, she swept the trail of ribbon off to the side then hesitantly lifted the lid off.

_Beeeeeeeeeeep._

She looked up at me with wide, cornflower blue eyes.

I only smiled at her.

"I thought you sold this to get out of Hyrule," she murmured.

"I did." She raised a sapphire earring from the nestled cotton. "But what happened to you made me realized I should never had left. From you. _Hey—_don't give me that look. That pawn shop sold it back to me after I made a bigger offer to get my own damn earring back. You loved this earring. You loved how I kept it as the only memoir from my mom. When she was gone, you told me she was with me forever. I told you that meant nothing, yet I used your words as my faith. With you at my side."

_Beeeeeeeep._

I anxiously picked up the earring and Zelda gave me her bare ear. "Only you could do that." I then clipped on the earring through the tiny piercing. Then I raised a metal tray to mirror her reflection. She hesitated, touching the blue with her light fingertips and twiddling with blue, lopsided eyes. Smiling weakly, she finally turned her head to view the diamond set in her flesh.

_Beeeeeeeeep._

"It's beautiful," she breathed, almost as if her whole soul was placed into that one breath, "thank you, Link. A great hero, you are."

_Beeeeeeeeeeeep._

"Zelda," I grabbed her, just in time for her eyes to be fluttering in a drowsy daze, "'Goodbye' will still hurt. And I'll still miss you. A lot more than you think… but if you have that faith of yours that you're with me… then_—_then maybe things wouldn't turn out so bad." I paused. She fought against the ambush of drowsiness. "I have hope." I murmur after her.

_Beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep._

Damn, there's an undeniable commotion roaring behind me. People_—_gods know where they came from_—_rushed all around me as intoxicating wildfire rages and the same frantic heat enveloped me but I stayed calm. Although my words come in short breaths to mirror her own.

"And maybe it's a bit… stupid… that the hero… would fall in love… when it's time to say goodbye…"

Zelda opened her eyes, seeming to force her heavy eyelids upwards to gaze at me with those same bright, blue orbs. Tears_—_happy tears_—_glittered in those orbs as she murmured, "I love you too, Link." Tears burning, she neared her face to mine. I was left to voluntary close the distance between us. I held back my own strength, she neared death but that didn't stop her from tasting as every single bit of hope and faith burned onto her lovely lips. _Sweet, soft, slow, this is Zelda_. "Dear hero, this is…" she murmured, her words, barely words, low against my lips.

Then.

I didn't need to hear the next sound from that machine.

I didn't need to be yelled at to be moved away from Zelda's side.

I didn't need to watch as the light from her eyes disappear and her last breath flutter into mine.

I didn't need any of that.

Except, maybe, for her one, last…

"…goodbye_._"

**[END]**

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><p>I HOPE YOU LOVED IT, <strong>MADMAGS<strong>! Happy late gift! ~loveandzelink


	2. II

**A/N: THIS IS NOT A SEQUEL TO "THIS IS GOODBYE_." _**This is part of a project called _Across the Fandom _and I felt like posting it here.

NO RELEVANCE TO "THIS IS GOODBYE_." _

~ loveandzelink

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><p><strong><em>II<em>  
><strong>

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><p>"<em>Watch out<em>!"

Upon those two words, instincts kicked at Zelda's wayward attention. Her natural impulse instructed to smoothly shift on high-heel clad feet. Yet, she bore so much elegance, the move would have brought shame to a professional dancer.

Her cerulean gaze then fell on a green-baring man intercepting a twisty-bladed dagger out of ruthless hands. Like lightning, the those hands snapped together. _Caught_ — and the green man guarded that fact by twisting the intruder so his wrists were confined with clinking chains. The belligerent intruder snarled as chains tightened, but the unscathed hero calmly replied that resistance was futile.

On another impulse, the princess smiled. Behind her, an entourage of guards hastily swarmed over.

"I'm in your debt, once again," she greeted him as the men left the princess and the hero approached her.

Link smiled, his smile was known for being sweet and quiet to best illustrate the Hylian garbed in ancient, green tunic. A matching cap obscured most of his sunny-shaded hair but a pair of honest orbs dubbed him for his sweetness. They scintillated in an azure light, slipping a demeanor of the humble ranch-hand before.

"It's always a pleasure to be on the princess's good graces," he spoke quietly, as always.

In response, Zelda raised a hand. "Please, Link. We've known each other far too long to still be on formalities. I am simply Zelda to you as you are simply Link to me." She paused, her hand to her cheek instead. "How long have we known each other?"

Link respectfully answered, "It's been a good year after that incident with Ganondorf and the Twilight." His expression saddened after the Twilight, but the azure spark in his eyes stayed semi-lit.

"Is that so?" The princess mused and twined her hands together. It occurred to her that this hero would stay diffident from such his simplistic manners, but the year must break such barriers.

He nodded once, then formed a muttered request, "Prin — Lady Zelda, if I may… speak to you about this past year."

She smiled, hers radiated elegance and compassion. "Come, then."

The two of them walked, side by side onto a path well-worn from many, bustling citizens. Those citizens reunited their groups of chatter and gossip after the incident with the intruder. Link smiled at the few who were openly grateful before softly clearing his throat. His azure gaze flickered between the variety of Castle Town stalls as the princess noticed his small sound, by training her eyes back onto the hero.

"The year has been long and an adventure of learning. I've learned so much about myself and the grand world of Hyrule that's impossible to learn from Ordon. And now—perhaps, I can learn more."

"What would you like learn about now?" She inquired, her eyes catching a florist's.

The hero paused before silently following after Her Highness; deliberately standing by as Zelda greeted the vendor with a flourish of her tongue. Waiting for Link, she patiently plucked at the blooms with a small hum guiding her hand from flower to flower. She kept the wordless song in her throat for only a small moment.

"The world." Link spoke the answer to the petal-strewn ground.

Zelda was sagaciously silent before choosing a single, red rose. Eyes enclosed, she raised the red bloom to her face and breathed in the heady scent before murmuring, "I thought you stated you had already accomplished such."

Link immediately snapped to her soothed gaze. "I meant the world outside of Hyrule." His left hand swooped to point out the picturesque panoply of rainbow blossoms, beside the preferred roses.

She smiled at his words and bent forward to select a few chosen. A snow-white daisy, a vermillion tulip, the pinkest lotus, a magenta-stained lily, and a butter-yellow iris all joined the single rose. A sweetly tossing zephyr whirled spring senses to the floral mingle and caused the blooms to colorfully splash. She comprehended, hence the hero softly smiled.

"I'm sure you'll do very well out there," Zelda assented easily, patting her gown for Rupees but Link laid a red jewel onto the florist's counter. The florist bowed graciously as Link led the princess back on path and on topic.

"It'll be a time-consuming excursion, but if you need me here, Zelda, I'd stay." Zelda thoughtfully lowered her head while peering at the different flowers in her hold. "That's ridiculous, Link. I shall not be a reason for you to still be rooted to Hyrule."

Link breathed tightly. He knew that he was the most utilitarian officer of her Royal Hyrulean Guards—as saving Hyrule was one feat all officers had not and never will accomplish—and he wished the princess would not deny such fact. Yet she wandered to a seamstress's stall with her cerulean eyes gazing upon the display fashion.

It was a simple blue dress, to Link's amazement. He inconspicuously sneaked a curious glance at the princess's florid gown of heavy, colored silk and dotting, golden fleur-de-lis. His mind wandered on why her cerulean gaze was filled with longing at the dress when the one she currently bore was much more exquisite. "Would you like that, as well?" He queried, reaching for his Rupees again.

"Nonsense, Link." Her answer delivered in a small laugh and she lightly smiled to thank Link's bright pathos for compassion. "My court would never allow such beautiful simplicity." She laughed again, yet humorless. "You've done enough for me and Hyrule." She easily emphasized Link's kindness with the wave of her small bouquet. "Please, do as you would like."

Link immediately stepped back to bow his head a little ways in Zelda's direction. "If you will, I would like to buy that dress for you." He could sense the dimmed longing in her facaded eyes; if she may be denying her own wishes, then she may be denying her wish for him to stay in Hyrule as well.

Her winsome smile hid against his pertinacious ways, dropping her hand to fold neatly before herself. "I would also think you would like more so to travel outside of Hyrule. Honestly, Link — you've done enough for Hyrule. Perhaps others around the world would need you."

Link hesitated to think further, then dubiously replying, "And you, Zelda?"

She lightened her smile to one of sadness, yet soft confidence. "I will be fine, no doubt about it."

The reaction Link gave her was one for Zelda to ponder that she should work on her persuasion. However, she did not mind his probity. Brushing off Link's conspicuous wariness, Zelda fisted her fingers into the ocean-blue fabric. "You have doubts that your kismet is still protecting the likes of me? You musn't think that way."

"Kismet?" Link slowly repeated, a rare smirk lining his lips.

"Fate, as you may call it."

"My fate may bring me here, if needed," Link remarked, furrowing along his brow.

She softened her demeanor as her wrist flickered to create a billowing of the dress. A small smile graced her lips, as she thought on. "Waves," she murmured sententiously, her tenderness tightening. Link stared since she was currently manifesting her wisdom by the faint shimmer of her Triforce. "They're caused by wind, correct? I've never seen the ocean. Perhaps I never will, but the world including Hyrule is much similar to the vast waters. We're all insignificant waves wavering on until we reach our highest point before reaching sand."

Link nodded along, inaudibly comprehending Zelda's esoteric wisdom as she distractedly billowed the dress's ultramarine skirt into wave-like motions; her allegory for the Hyrulean people to Link's understanding.

"We're all to achieve the same fate, yet the chosen are to achieve more. Much more."

"How so?" Link questioned, scratching the side of his hat.

Zelda smiled all-knowingly, "The chosen shall create bigger waves. The chosen are bigger waves. Then again, all waves shall reach sand, but the chosen were the ones to achieve a point where others had not." Releasing the dress, Zelda concentrated to a disquieted Link. "I believe the winds of fate wish to mold you into a much bigger wave, Link. As a chosen, it is your fate after all "

The hero fell silent, his observant eyes still on the princess. She smiled as the gears in his mind worked in his silent manner. Suddenly, he looked up and she knew from his tacit nod that she was finally fathomed.

"If fate wishes me so and you are most positively sure that is my fate, then I'll be departing at dawn tomorrow." Zelda breathed a small sigh through her encouraging smile, but Link spoke on. "But Zelda — don't you wish to see the ocean?" he asked with an inquisitive glint in his azure gaze.

"I wish so," Zelda truthfully answered as an entourage of guards approached her.

xxxxxxxxx

As dawn broke the horizon the next day, Zelda found a corpse of her red rose — black as midnight and fallen as Ganondorf from Hyrule's power. Yet the other lovely blooms lit beautifully as morning day while the day eased on without the rose. And Zelda continued to rule Hyrule without the help of the hero erasing the tales of crime.

But Zelda knew Link was traveling to his heart's content. And perhaps it was of her magical touch or perhaps even coincidental fate intercepted as weeks and weeks gone by — each flower would part, according to Link. After the rose gone the daisy — so fair and innocent — as Link had written he'd visited a land so peaceful and full of white innocence. Then the tulip and iris — lands of perfected fame and wise, faithful hopefuls. Almost coming to the end was the dying lily, when Link described of peeking at the very blue ocean from such a pure-hearten land.

The princess heavily anticipated the lotus — the water lily. She waited and waited until death does its part. Soon enough, death arrived by unfurling shades of unworldly darkness from the canary-yellow center of the lotus. On the same day, a letter arrived along with a parcel.

Zelda blinked at the huge item completely wrapped in warm, tan paper. Her gaze shifted to the black blooms crying lifeless petals upon her lightly lit vanity and then back to the parcel upon her bed. Shuffling along her silent elation, she anxiously sat beside the package for the quietest of moments before nearing her bare hand.

Her long index finger and thumb pinched only a corner of the parcel and then slowly pulled the crinkly paper back. Instantly, she received an eyeful of wave-like fabric. Taken aback, she hastily ripped until breathtakingly lifting the blue fabric into the air.

It was the dress.

The dress she should never have.

The dress she would love to have.

Dazzled by such a indulgent gift, she found herself flaunting the dress during the most darkening hours. Giddy, she peeked at the vanity mirror's reflection.

Immediately, she was bedazzled by how the elegance in such a simple design. She knew she held well-refined taste and denying such a lovely dress would be a crime. Perhaps the winds of fate allowed her to keep such a simple luxury when she obeyed fate all this time after all. Smiling that Link had been the one to push at fate, she strode back to her bed to realize another was intertwined with the paper. Zelda cleared the trash until her hand met at soft stone.

She lifted the stone to her face for a moment, yet still not cracking at her wisdom, she then lifted the stone to the nearest candlelight.

A small shell.

Twined through braided rope, a twirling seashell flashed colors of the sandy surface with swirls of wavy blue. A scrap of a letter stuck to the shell's smooth skin.

_This is only a part of the ocean. Could you hear your wave?_

Zelda couldn't help the silly smile blooming across her lips when Link thought about her wish to the ocean. So with the smile still enhancing her lips, she childishly brought the seashell to her ear. As her eyes began to flutter close as the beats of butterfly wings would pulse, she could eavesdrop onto the faint _whoosh_—as if her whole world was quieted for the rhythmic _whoosh_ swirling over and over again. The waves drew a quiet solace for the princess and she imagined Link would be at complete and utter peace with such silent, soothing sounds.

Fate could not have been more conscious of Link and Zelda when they both slumbered to waves.

xxxxxxxxxx

_Meet me at midnight._

Zelda bit back an unusually giddy smile as she crept out of the castle, to the destined meeting place, to reunite with the destined hero. After these days turning into weeks turning into many months, Zelda finally seized the chance to see Link again. Hopefully, without her ever-creeping guards or the exigent council on her tail.

Still, she wanted to repay him for his thoughtfulness and had the riches of Hyrule at her disposal, yet she knew Link dare not accept. He traveled through foreign lands so whatever Hyrule had to offer, he must have seen a much more extraordinary version before. Then that his heart of gold would have refused such gifts. Which lead to Zelda finalizing on donning the ocean dress and the shell necklace at her neck.

Link would appreciate if his gifts were not in vain.

Giggling from her wise idea, she smoothed out the soft, ocean-blue fabric before turning the corner to the dressmaker's stand. To her dismay, Link was absent so Zelda simply sat nearby along with inconspicuously hiding herself from anybody not bathed in green. Tugging her dark cloak closer, Zelda leaned farther into the shadows and brought a familiar hood onto her blond head. Bright blue peeked from beneath the expanse of black, but the princess suggested such a quiet section of Castle Town. She was correct, none roamed such silent streets.

She only breathed in the cool night air when suddenly a male whisper crossed her lost mind. She twisted, her hood falling and cerulean eyes widening.

"Link…"

Fate may be conscious of Link and Zelda, but they are cruel as well. Fate dare brought a cupidity-taken man on the same night to purloin the unsuspecting. He believed the safest part of town was also the wealthiest. A twisty-bladed dagger serviced the robber before he caught sight of the disguised princess with the necklace of twisting stone. Just as he was to entangle into Zelda's life, he espied a green-baring man. The robber knew this man. This hero. This one to drag his dear brother to the dungeons. Fate could not brought a more tragic calamity as the robber immediately changed the course of whose life to take.

Link surely noticed, however.

"_Watch out!_" He screamed as the dagger flew at his direction.

Once again, Zelda neatly slipped out of her way and slammed into Link's. Into the dagger's way where twisted edges met skin and easily pierced through. Crimson made way down Zelda's dress and pooled onto the moonlit cobblestones.

The robber didn't see the dying hero, oh, but the dying princess. He paled a ghostly shade and fled. Ran far far off, never again to be seen in Hyrule's streets.

On the other hand, the hero immediately caught the damsel of the princess firmly by her shoulders as she miserably moaned and by pained instinct, whisked her head downward. He resisted the urge to run after the monster but lost the temperance to call for help while Zelda's life was fading — thread by thread.

"Hang on, Princess!" he galvanized, gently lifting her long, wan hair to observe the harm. The dagger pierced Zelda's side to unfortunately be considered fatal. Blood collected around as death had to the lotus; from the center of the murderous dagger spreading the shades of dark crimson onto the princess' ocean dress. Link applied pressure to the blossoming wound and gritted his teeth together as the sounds of her breathing was slower and labored — breath by breath.

"Link…"

The hero responded by pulling the quiescent princess's head up to meet his shaky, azure eyes. He was nervously hapless to her limpid impasse of death. She would never believe the day—the day the hero was _scared_. "Prin—Zelda, Zelda, dare not move. You're the princess, you shall be all right, please be all right… fate dare not let such," he beseeched, guilt edging along his partly bloodstained self.

"If fate —" Zelda soporifically paused, her breath becoming a wave to crash upon sand. Her whisper of words were still dulcet to Link's ears as she neared the seashore. "If fate wished… wished that I am the one to be fall… then let fate be," she mused in a last breath — crashing — bringing her head and eyes down.

Link bit back a penitent cry of shame for bringing the princess to such tragic fate. For a moment, he mourned the loss of Hyrule's sovereign. Yet, his heroic mind defogged the death and he exculpated himself by finalizing to never allowing such fate.

Link's right hand upon Zelda's Triforce of Wisdom, he whispered to her, "You believed I was a chosen. I now believe I am one as well." Here, he lightly squeezed her hand — bringing a small glow to her Triforce, "And so are you. But together, perhaps we must have been the highest in all of Hyrule's ocean. Yet, the winds of fate must not allow such waves, would it? One of us has to sacrifice the higher fall for sinning against fate so the other can reach kismet."

As he fought the bearing tears, he reminisced a far-away belief that the Triforce can combine to save. One of Courage, one of Wisdom, can save when at an impasse of crimson staining against a heart that beats against none. "As small insignificant waves, one will take the higher fall. The other chosen must reach the winds of fate." He repeated in a half-heard murmur as his courage glowed brighter and brighter against Zelda's light illumination of wisdom.

"Please let fate will smile upon you…"

Brighter and brighter, until resplendent light consumed both Link and Zelda.

"I believe that this is my fate."

**[END]**


	3. III

**a/n:** This is the final and and the longest and the third installment of "This is Goodbye." Reason? The lovely number three.  
><span>Summary<span>: It's the mid-nineteenth century and Hyrule is at war. Technology has advanced and Hyrule has fallen behind as a bomb makes its mark in Castle Town. This is the oneshot of two Hylians who remain alive. ZELINK.

P.S. It's another year for the (Vocaloid) Kagamine's release date today and so they technically deserve a Happy Birthday! (Aishiteru, Len-kun!)

**WARNING: A LOT OF BLOOD LOSS.** So if you're a faint of heart, then please don't read and then go blame me, since one character loses like half their blood supply. Eww.

HAPPY READING!

~ loveandzelink

* * *

><p><strong><em>III<br>_**

* * *

><p>"Link!"<p>

"_Link!_"

Instead of an appearance, the futile cry disappeared, as well as the picturesque capital of Hyrule had. The populous mark of Hyrulean architecture, the Temple of Time, now crumbled into an abstract shack. The wizened tree that once towered over cavernous castles now trashed along silent streets. But the capital within the capital, Hyrule Castle, was no more than a hole within an abysmal hole.

This devastated wasteland was once a girl's dear home.

Moans and groans haunted the destruction and this girl. However, she knew these people were very much alive, yet they were very much dead. She tripped onward, gripping something within her white fingers that clenched deep into her palms that she might have crushed it. If it might have been something she could grip and break with her white hands.

Hope fluttered.

The tortured sounds drifted as their last. She forced herself to believe she had gone too far. She was already wringing her hope dry by the devastation of her home and she was wringing _his_ time drier by the miniscule moments of apologies to those sounds. However, hope fluttered and she moved on.

She couldn't say she was the only one moving onward. A dark follower snaked between her steps, but it could not contaminate her for her hope was her lantern to life. Dread moved on, moved onto those with crimson slipping and those realizing a frantic loneliness. But her villain of death—it surrounded her like a fog that silently smothered. But she won't die, she couldn't for hope was still on her side, even as death and dread collaborated to taunt her in ways of many cordial corpses.

She tired of death.

Suddenly, her toes caught underneath a fallen branch and she consequentially tumbled onto something. It moved before releasing a screeching moan. Frozen, she looked into a flat, monstrous face with eyes of complete, inhuman black.

She screamed.

In the middle of her scream, she somehow got back onto her own two feet, only to then stumble backwards again and crash into another being. She shrilly screamed on; the flat, monotonous face would mirror again.

However, she shut her mouth.

As if on cue, she choked on her own breath. All at once, in both verbal and emotional form, she cried, "_Link_…"

He did not reply, he could not, with his eyes gently masked by the layer of his lids and the gentle form of his mouth set into eternal line. His abundance of blood dashed all over his white button-down and started from a dash of his blonde hairline. So much blood…

"Link," she choked. Scrambling to kneel by his side, she trailed her fingers over his face. Hope was freed and no longer fluttered for her. "Link… Link… for the goddesses, please wake up!" Her tears acclimated to when she had to wipe them away with her skirt, instead of her wet hands. "Don't leave me! Don't you dare! Gods, Link, _don't you know?_—we hadn't said our goodbyes and our I love you's and don't you ever dare, _Link_!" But she knew she lost all hope when her hands quivered, but still held purpose as they moved to his hand, a fist. One by one, they slowly pried each finger apart.

Finally, her eyes beheld a golden Triforce in its glory of nonexistent scratches. A tiny hook hinted its function to be used as mere jewelry. However, Zelda slipped off the counterpart and beseeched in vain,

"Link, why? _Why?_ Your life for _this_?"

Sobbing, she dwindled into the crook of his neck. She clung to his soothing scent under the layer of cold and silence and death. She couldn't pry away as her lips moved for his name in a mournful quietude, until she noticed something, something unusual, much louder than his name.

There was a beat.

Hastily, she twisted her head so her long ears pressed against his neck. Like a child searching for the heartbeat of her mother, she searched down to his chest then upon his heart. There it was again. The beat pulsed faintly yet she reveled in that beat until she looked up.

"Link," she whispered. He did not respond so she attempted once again, flourishing in volume. "Link, Link! Link! _Link!"_

Till Link chanced a breath, a hasty one, and a couple more, before he barely whispered in a soundless voice, "Gods, Zelda."

Zelda bubbled in relief. "Link?"

"Gods," he whispered again, "don't tell me you're dead too."

She couldn't help it, she burst into hysteria, giggling, "We're all alive, thank Gods…"

Link chanced a smile, but immediately lurched forward to Zelda's horror, and then spewed blood with Zelda's wide eyes on him. He eventually gagged the last, before he wiped his mouth with his already blood-soaked sleeve. In response, she wept and he immediately embraced her close.

"It's okay," he soothed then whimpered, "but my legs, dear _Gods_, my legs…"

Zelda habitually glanced at his legs, which was hidden by a concrete slab. She frowned before crawling over. She gripped it, before she eventually lifted. Link hissed in pain, gnashing his teeth together, as Zelda threw the slab off her skinny muscles. She then looked over and shrilly screamed before a rose of bile cut her off.

Link looked, but did not say nor do anything.

They both were suddenly stilled as copious amounts of blood drained from Link's left leg, or what was left of it. (HAHA, PUN.) Their shaky eyes suspected the disappearances of Link's whole calf and knee. Link sucked in a breath at his severed leg as he withered in hope. She whimpered, crying as she took Link's pale hands to her cheek.

"Link, Link," Zelda sobbed, stifling her sob into his palm.

"Zelda." Link smiled instead. "Please." Finalizing a hasty decision, he slipped a hand away from both of hers and down his leg; until his hand slipped into his pant's pocket. He weakly held his breath before uncovering a hefty Rupees bag.

Zelda questioned him with cornflower-blue eyes.

"Link?"

"Take it." He let the bag slip onto her lap and the dulled corners of jewels dug into her skirt. "And leave. Please. Take it and leave to Father and Mam and Aryll. Tell them—please tell them—" But Zelda pressed a finger against his chapped lips, a stoically scary mask upon her pale profile.

Disquieted, Zelda allowed a moment of vulnerability as dread finally slinked along her sides, before she abruptly stood and the bag dropped onto the blood-stained ground. Link stared, but she did not hesitate to wound her arm around his waist. She never ceased to amaze him as she successfully hoisted Link up. She then leaned him against her, ripped off half her skirt, and tied it firmly against his bloody nub. He never ceased to amaze her as he stayed quiet with her fingers tightening and tightening the bandage's knot. She finally stood against Link's faltering warmth.

"Don't you ever dare think that I'll ever leave you," she mumbled, hooking his right arm around her neck.

Link smiled before grimacing, asking for death more than ever with the lingering spasms of pain from his left leg. But he only asked Zelda to keep the Rupees and she slipped the bag around her waist.

They set off.

But they didn't know exactly where. It was quite difficult to tell where they were since every major mark was either in pieces or completely gone. However, time could be gathered as Zelda looked back at the perturbing path of dripping crimson. She hoped she neared civilization since the trail weaved around taller buildings now. Yet, she was closer for Link to begin the process of dying.

They stopped a moment for Link to kneel down and to have his moments and to have Zelda realize it wasn't long. She paled, almost begging death as she kept Link's damp bangs from straying to his blood-stained lips.

"Talk to me, Link, talk to me," she begged, the moment they were able to walk off together.

He allowed a small smile and an unneeded pause to increase her worry.

Finally, he spoke, "If I get through this—"

"When," she interrupted, gritting her teeth.

"If—"

"When," Zelda sternly repeated.

Link laughed, a nice chuckle to speak for his liveliness, "_If _I make this," He turned to her, brightening his mocking smile, "I want you to say yes."

Zelda swayed. "Yes?"

Link slowly shook his head away, still smiling to the point of looking goofy in such a dire place. But then he turned back to her, a sheepish smile paired with a sheepish question, "Marry me?"

She stared at him, at his tangled mop of blonde, at his bloody face, at his one leg (Got the 'Get on one leg' part!) and she'd say no. But she dare wouldn't with her mirroring mess of long blonde hair and his blood on her ragged dress and her self.

"No," she answered, tugging him along.

"What?" he laughed.

"No," she repeated firmly, walking on.

"What? Why?" He limped to the right, bumping into her.

She bumped back, but saddened as she replied, "Live."

But before either can breathe a syllable, a light flickered in the distance. Both Link and Zelda immediately searched in the horizon for the direction for a breathing being. But only one responded in a boisterous reaction.

"Hey!" Zelda yelled, waving her one free arm, "Help us! Help! Please help us!"

"Careful, Zelda," Link heroically pulled her behind him, clumsily limping from losing his lean upon her. "We don't know if it's one of them."

Instead of coming forward, a being of red eyes and childish cackles circled around the couple in a flash, before disappearing as quickly as it appeared. Zelda found her irregular nails digging into Link's arm when she espied a crescent smile on the being's face. But Link only released each torturous nail from his slicing into his sleeve. Breaking out of a trance, Zelda apologized profusely and Link quieted her to point out a flashing glimmer from the ground.

They both walked forward to the glimmer. Link bent down to reveal the glimmer as a corked bottle.

"What is it?" he murmured, waving the bottle around to observe the red, flashing liquid slosh around the sides. "Some sort of potion?"

"Don't drink it, Link, you don't know if—" Before Zelda can finish the same warning Link had given her, Link had popped the cork off and threw his head back to take a swig.

Zelda screamed.

Link had toppled away from her—shattering the bottle—and fell onto his hands and knee to heave a plethora of crimson and Zelda clamped her mouth shut as she stumbled over. Afterward, he immediately collapsed on onto his blood-stained ground as she shakily kneeled by his laying form once again. When her shaky eyes found his untangling bandage, she leaned over his body to mend the knot, but Link suddenly screamed in agony. His right knee smashed Zelda's nose as he arched in pain with his hand choking his throat and the other raking across his chest. She bled and recoiled, but then neared again to pry Link's hands apart with her own.

"Link, Link," she whispered as Link seethed with pain and crushed her grip, "Please, stay with me, please, Link."

And just as the strange being appeared and disappeared, such happened with Link's attack.

He started to breathe again and his hands curled around Zelda's; all the while, he gazed up at her with the most unfathomable expression that kept dread alive and near. However, he soon reached up a pale hand and cleared away the trail of blood above Zelda's lips.

"I'm sorry." His apology directed for two things, Zelda realized, with his gaze on the bottle shards.

She smiled lightly in acceptance, finishing the knot on his leg once again, before replying, "I'm all right, Link." She feared dread as she asked, "Are you all right?"

Link responded by standing up alone, to Zelda's surprise. She stood up as well, taking his right arm around her neck, before she whispered if he was absolutely positive he was all right to walk.

He took the first step.

They set off once again, but Zelda noticed Link was regaining his color and his energy. A wave of solace washed over her worry as he settled his tousled head upon hers, then his cheek burned warmth. With his heat slowly firing up, she fervently hoped the potion fared well for him.

"Zelda?" Link mumbled.

She looked up. "Hhmmm?"

"Blue roof and gray paint…"

Zelda burst into giggles, using her free hand to press against Link's forehead, "Are you sure you're all right, Link?"

"Don't you know?" Link coughed, and she put her hand onto his arm. "You wanted a blue roof and gray paint."

She giggled again, stifling into Link's shirt that disturbingly soaked of blood. But his words still kindled her to laugh, "Why on earth would I want that?"

He curved a lopsided smile before murmuring, "I'd always imagined us together with the cute little house in here and we'd live close to Father and Mam, but you specifically said you wanted—"

"—a house of blue roof and gray paint." She smiled brilliantly against her glowing cornflower-blue eyes. "You'd fix the roof every month or so and call me up to lay underneath the sun."

"That'd be our grand hello to the world," he exclaimed with so much vigor that dread had called death to surrender together. "Then you'd grow poppies and pansies from the windowsills."

Zelda beamed when she caught onto the dream from giddy ten-year-olds, "And in the mornings, I'd pack you lunch before you caught the train with your father to the Hyrulean Military Office. Although you'd rather work on the battlefield—"

"—if it wasn't for the girl at home," he finished, staring off into space, into a dreamland.

Zelda smiled lightly, her mind screaming in victory, instead of fear, and she said, "Because you promised her."

Link faced her, questioning her with azure eyes. "Oh?"

She nestled into Link's pulsing neck. "Don't die."

"Impossible," Link immediately answered in a laugh, "I wouldn't have dared agreed to such—"

"You dare _did _say yes." Zelda's gaze flickered upward, teasing him with daring, cornflower-blue eyes.

"How could I?" He pressed forward to bump his forehead with hers. "I was merely ten and unfortunately attached, against my will, to a daring girl who dared me anything and I dare did everything she dared me."

"Nonsense," she bumped back, beaming, "you had shackled me as well."

"How so?" he inquired, furrowing his brow.

She flushed before she quietly revealed, "I'd marry you."

And Link smiled a mega-watt smile that could have lit up the entire town and beyond as he had clicked two and two together, realizing the equilibrium for his return of survival balanced for his earn of her love. He could have everything he dreamed of and built of, with her, if he'd only remain alive.

"Say it first," he teased and limped ahead, "and I'll live for you. For us." Then his smile illuminated brighter to shine the stars.

Zelda twisted her face in a flush, before she shakily began, "I—"

A blast tore off her sentence and she was torn away from Link.

Debris and smog threw themselves at her as she strained to breathe and to find where her Link was. Instead, she found glowering amber eyes with a head of fiery hair that stood in the distance. Before she could curse his name, he fled with the help of a swooping jet.

She cursed his name underneath the pile of dread and death.

And before she knew it, she realized she was being smothered, slowly and silently, and she realized she was falling into the world without her Link.

"Zelda?"

She would have cried out if death hadn't binded her to its will. However, a sliver of light fell onto her deathly world and she finally met the eyes of her azure.

"Gods," the owner pleaded, "don't let her be as worse as me."

She wanted to tell him she was okay. Just smothered.

"Zelda?" His voice rang from above and she knew he was there, but she just didn't have her voice to say she was too. "Zelda, Zelda, gods help me, but please don't die. Don't even be dead."

"Mmm," she groaned, when his pleads forced her to restore her hold on life.

"Zel?"

As if being truly smothered, she wriggled in her state of dazed consciousness until that silent death flew off of her. Her surroundings were still desolate and devastated, but she was safe and she could clearly place those azure eyes belonging to him.

"Link?"

"Don't die…"

Zelda breathed heavily, placing another thought that _this_ wasn't the right promise. "But Link, you were… Link… this wasn't—"

"Zel," Strangely, he bore a crescent smile than a familiar, lopsided curve and she was bombarded by the frantic loneliness dread would have feasted on, "open the bag." His flashing, azure eyes glanced at the Rupees bound at her waist.

"Link?" she questioned, but her hands reached for the ragged bag. Then her fingers plucked at the strings, causing a break for the bag's opening.

"Zelda."

She peered into the opening and she looked back up at Link and she whispered, "There's nothing in here… was it supposed to save you, Link? Will you live? Link, you'll live if I'll say—"

"Don't die."

And when Zelda observed his line of gaze on the bag again, she found a scrap of cloth fluttering. She took it, gazed into Link's assuring azures, before scanning the cloth. Afterward, she furrowed her temple in confusion, flipped her gaze back to Link, and then flipped the cloth.

And she read again.

Silent, she looked back up at Link's open azures for several moments. She sensed a coming belief in those written words until she noticed those open azures were not lit anymore.

"Link?"

Her hands clasped his still head and she screamed for his proof of life, "NO! For us! I love you! Get up! Get up and _live_ and don't die—please don't be dead—Link, please… for us…" She dwindled in hope until she mourned in the crook of his neck, with her fingers not choking hope, but rather the materialistic cloth.

One by one, her fingers curled over each second that drummed without his beat.

"I love you," Zelda sobbed and she felt herself die a little.

xxxxxxxxxx

No one knew how long the two had been entangled, but three figures stood above for several moments now.

All three bore blonde heads and azure-glazed eyes. They said nothing, but the male bent away from the two females and slipped a cloth from a girl's white fingers.

The three recoiled from the bloody ink, but read a side as "For Father, Mam, and Aryll. I love you all." A five-digit number of Rupees was scrawled at the bottom. Then the cloth was switched to the other side to reveal a simple three-worded line.

The three recognized the line for their son's Zelda.

The youngest of the three pried away from her family to embrace the fallen girl. At ten, the azure-eyed girl cried and stopped when her tears dripped and consequently awoke Zelda. And she remarkably smiled at the three as she planted her head atop Link's chest.

There was a beat.

**[E****ND]**


End file.
